


Support

by Im_The_Doctor (Bofur1)



Category: Transformers: Prime
Genre: Anger, Angst and Feels, Apologies, Arguing, Awkward Conversations, Best Friends, Car Accidents, Fever, Forgiveness, Help, Hugs, Hurt/Comfort, Injury Recovery, Major Character Injury, Medical Trauma, Moral Dilemmas, Nausea, Pain, Pre-Earth Transformers, Rants, Rift, Stubborn Mechs, Trapped In Elevator, Unresolved Tension, Vulnerability
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-31
Updated: 2015-12-31
Packaged: 2018-05-10 13:19:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,649
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5587159
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bofur1/pseuds/Im_The_Doctor
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If you were to get trapped in an elevator, who would you want with you? Whatever Ratchet's answer to this question would be, it turns out he could do a whole lot worse than Orion Pax.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Support

Orion and Ratchet found themselves in the same lift one night.

On any other day, this wouldn’t be a problem—in fact, just the opposite: they would be discussing plans for tomorrow or checking their schedules to see when they could put together a visit with a group of their friends. If Ratchet was feeling like he needed a confession—

 _No, don’t start to hope_ , Orion stopped that idea almost before it could form. Who knew if Ratchet would confess anything to him again? Recently Ratchet had confided in him about a moral dilemma a patient had created. This was nothing new, but the situation had quickly gone downhill when they had disagreed _strongly_ on both sides about Ratchet’s solution to the problem, particularly because he was interning at a different clinic than usual and any misstep could be disastrous for him.

It was rare that he and Ratchet argued; in fact, Orion could count the times on one hand. This had, by far, been the worst of their spats, enough to make his good friend actually lunge to his feet, thereby flinging the energon cube he held near Orion’s head, and storm out without another word.

Not long afterward, Orion had received word that there had been an accident—a reckless, angry mech paying no attention to where he was going, an airway pod…Though Ratchet was recovering, already back on his feet and working, Orion couldn’t help but feel that if he hadn’t made the junior medic so angry, the crash and his injuries may not have happened. Orion had been coming to the clinic for the past few orns, hoping to apologize, but there was always something else to take up Ratchet’s attention. Who knew if Ratchet was doing that on purpose?

The two hadn’t spoken for several orns now, due to Orion’s guilt and Ratchet’s grudge. Orion had been losing a lot of recharge at night over it and even now the thought of the entire ordeal made him feel sick, the energon he was drinking currently roiling as it went down his intake valve.

He’d already pressed the buttons for the lift when he saw Ratchet coming down the corridor, looking tired and a bit faded. Orion scanned his left leg disapprovingly; Ratchet had removed the supporting frame and he was putting most of his weight on the limb at _least_ a quintun early. Despite the fact that Orion was blatantly staring at him, Ratchet hadn’t spotted him, keeping his optics fixed on his awkwardly limping feet.

While it was rare that the pair argued, it was even rarer for Ratchet to have his guard down like this.

“D-Did you repair your patient?” Orion asked cautiously, not sure how else to get his friend’s attention. It was obvious Ratchet was exhausted, but it wouldn’t be the first time he’d overworked by orns, taking only brief minutes of recharge here and there.

Ratchet’s head snapped up, his startled expression proving that he hadn’t been paying any attention whatsoever. “Orion,” he muttered, sounding less than pleased. “Yes, the patient is recovering nicely with his sparkmate by his side. It only took us three orns to figure out what his glitch was. What about you? Archive anything interesting?”

Orion somehow doubted the medic actually wanted an answer to that question, but he reminded himself that his purpose was to make amends, so he replied politely, “Several articles on phase technology, how they work intuitively when it comes to choosing what’s solid and what isn’t.”

After that both mechs stood quietly on opposite sides of the lift, leaving a near-tangible distance between them. Orion’s processor was racing, trying to come up with what he could say to start a decent conversation. Perhaps he should just apologize outright? Nervously he took a sip of his energon, giving Ratchet a sideways glance. He was leaning heavily on his good leg now, not bracing himself against the lift wall lest he put more pressure on his injury.

_He really should have kept the splint frame on…_

Just as sympathy stirred, Orion’s thoughts were interrupted by a loud screech, precipitating the lift coming to a halt mid-descent. The stop was abrupt enough to throw Ratchet off balance, stumbling halfway across the cabin and swiping through air for the rail on his side. Orion impulsively caught his friend by the shoulders before he could hit one of the walls.

Ratchet grimaced, struggling to regain his balance and shrugging Orion’s hands off in the process.

“Let go…”

The lift remained very silent and still, causing Ratchet to frown at the doors and ceiling.

“What in the Pit just happened?”

Orion swallowed uneasily, pressing the lift panel’s alarm. It blinked, informing them that the alarm was ringing in someone’s office.

“Diode will probably solve the problem,” Orion announced of the medic who oversaw the hospital, sounding overconfident even to his own audials. Ratchet scoffed.

“ _Please_. Diode went home joors ago, Orion. No sane bot—at least none of the ones I could trust to fix this correctly—is out of recharge to help us right now.”

Orion felt a tingle of defensiveness, not only for the blatant insult to the workers on the night shift but also for Ratchet’s derision toward his idea. “So we’re trapped in this lift together until the morning, Ratchet? Take advantage of it. Now is the time to make me suffer for ‘betraying’ you.”

Momentarily Ratchet looked surprised before tearing their optics apart, glowering at a point on the wall at Orion’s back. Sighing, the archivist lowered himself to the floor, balancing his energon cube on one thigh. Still not looking at him, Ratchet followed suit with a weighty clunk, stretching out his injured leg and pulling the other to his chest.

Now that he was sitting, Orion was starting to become aware of how tired he was, having deprived himself of recharge to fret these past few orns. Perhaps he could recharge while waiting for the lift alarm to be noticed. Ratchet already seemed to have thought of it; he was slumped against the wall, optics shuttered. Thus Orion readjusted so he was lying on his side, his back to the medic.

A long, uncomfortable time later, Orion was brought out of light recharge by Ratchet’s voice, terse and edgy.

“Tell me about phase technology. Or a—a story about your coworkers. Do you have any?”

Again Orion sighed deeply, in no mood for what he just knew was an attempt at moving past their problem without an apology. “No, I don’t, Ratchet, and I only skimmed the phase technology data pad. You should try to recharge like I am.”

“Because…” Ratchet continued as though he hadn’t heard, “…ah, if you don’t distract me, I swear I’m going to cry in a klik or two here…”

“What?” Orion sat straight up and turned, almost hitting his head against the side railing. Now that he was looking at Ratchet, he could see shivers trailing down his entire frame but his hands, which were clamped around his thigh like a vice. Orion checked his chronometer, calculating that they had been trapped in here for about two joors now. How much of that time had Ratchet been sitting this way?

“Where are the circuit speeders you were prescribed?” Orion asked apprehensively.

Ratchet’s vents hissed as he gave his friend a pain-twisted smile. “I ran out sometime…yesterday. I was too busy with my patient to refill.”

“Ratchet,” Orion murmured, all of his thoughts on that conveyed through the word.

“I thought I would be alright,” Ratchet ground out, the plating on his knuckles flaring as he somehow tightened his grip. “Until…I got home…I thought I’d manage…”

Helplessly Orion glanced around the lift carriage, finding nothing he could use to help. Ratchet didn’t even have his medical kit; he must have forgotten it in his hurry to leave. Orion only had his energon cube, mostly empty. Hastily he closed it and kept it close as he crept across the floor. He stopped at Ratchet’s side, ignoring the wary expression the medic wore, and very gently laid a hand on his knee strut.

“May I…?”

Orion was rather taken aback when Ratchet’s rigid EM field suddenly lashed out, emotions uncontrolled. There was pain first and foremost, but even in the brief contact before Ratchet reined it back in, Orion sensed something else he hadn’t felt from Ratchet in quite a while: fear.

Orion kindly said nothing of it, Ratchet refusing—or finding himself unable—to look at him. Finally Ratchet nodded weary consent and Orion carefully lifted his leg and propped it on the energon cube to keep it slightly flexed.

Beyond that, Orion had no idea what to do. Between the two of them, he was _not_ the medic. Ratchet had only taught him the basics of repair, so he wouldn’t have to come into the clinic every time his fingers caught on the sharp edge of a data pad and wouldn’t stop bleeding.

“You shouldn’t have removed the splint frame so soon,” Orion told him quietly.

“Oh, I’m _fully_ aware, Orion,” Ratchet spat, tightly shuttering his optics. “You don’t have to tell me I was wrong, trust me. I know, just like I know you told _me_ what to do about _my_ patient’s morals because you were convinced _your_ morals were right. The problem was that I wasn’t asking for your advice, I just wanted a friend to listen to me! S-Sometimes you have bad timing—”

There Ratchet was cut off, his frame seizing through another wave of pain. Orion’s reflex was to grab Ratchet and keep him close through that wave, but he wasn’t sure Ratchet would appreciate touch that wasn’t welcome.

This was why Orion was so shocked when out of nowhere Ratchet’s left hand left its place beside the right and latched onto his wrist. It was tight enough to be painful, but Orion didn’t pull away. He doubted he could have if he wanted to, which he didn’t. This was confirmation that touch was something his friend wanted, but he didn’t want to go too far or Ratchet would backpedal and recoil from him. Gingerly Orion expanded his EM field, seeking out Ratchet’s and pulsing comfort, reassurance that he was there for him.

Ratchet’s only reaction was a little flinch. He was venting steam, indicating that his systems were overheating. Through Ratchet’s grip on him, Orion could feel when the pain receded. Ratchet opened his optics, their natural teal hue dimmed but shining.

 _Scrap_ , Orion mentally whispered as realization arrived. Ratchet’s earlier warning was being proven true: he was in tears. Even in the sorrow he felt for this, Orion couldn’t help the warm affection building, urging him to readjust so he could wedge his free arm, his right between Ratchet’s shoulders and the wall.

It was a difficult hug, but a hug nonetheless. Ratchet needed that. As expected, the medic stiffened against his chest, but shockingly didn’t pull away—in fact, just the opposite. He twisted, hissing in pain as he did so, removed his right hand from his leg and placed it on Orion’s back to keep him there.

They sat like this for a long time, Ratchet still clenching Orion’s wrist and Orion holding on to him with his arm around his back. They went through every new pain wave together, tensing in unison. It seemed to be working because Ratchet never once tried to push him away when the pain subsided. Instead Orion could feel Ratchet’s vents slow and his spark pulse calm whenever the agony let off a bit.

“Hello? Is anyone in there?”

The voice startled them both, Orion looking up and Ratchet recoiling, looking dazed and confused.

“It must be Security,” Orion murmured in relief. They were going to be released! Carefully he extracted himself from Ratchet’s grip and moved to the control panel.

While he calmly explained who they were and that they needed to get out of the elevator urgently, he kept an optic on Ratchet, who was slumped against the wall again. Even though he couldn't feel it anymore, he still knew when the medic’s pain reached its peak and when it subsided a bit. His face would relax just a bit, but never fully because the anticipation of more, possibly worse torture was always there.

Not long later the Security mech redirected the lift call to Diode, who sounded rather cross at having been summoned from his home.

“Who is this?”

“Diode, it’s Orion Pax. I’m with Ratchet. I trust you’ve been informed…Please tell me you know what’s wrong with this lift,” Orion pleaded.

“Security and a technician are working on the problem as quickly as possible.”

Orion thanked him and then hesitated, continuing softly enough that he hoped Ratchet wouldn’t hear. “Please hurry. Ratchet needs his injured leg to be treated and re-framed. Could you please have a hover chair and a…” He searched quickly for the name. “…an Alpha Particle painkiller chip prepared for him?”

Diode’s sigh was audibly irritated. “Those are in short supply, Orion Pax. Ratchet knows that and as uncomfortable as he may be, he knows it’s not the end of the world. Have him take the circuit speeders supplied to him and he’ll survive a night in the lift.”

That stung, both on Ratchet’s behalf and because Orion was helpless while watching his best friend in misery. He in-vented deeply, convincing himself that he truly didn’t want to lash out. He didn’t, but he did anyway.

“Do you think he wouldn’t have done that already, sir?! He’s run out and has had no time to restock because he’s been overworking himself in _your_ fragging hospital, with no recharge and hardly any fuel, under your watch—or the _lack_ of it—and then when he’s trapped for joors on end in your fragging lift cubicle, you decide to withhold _one_ A.P.P, which could keep him from suffering? Let me tell you this, sir: if you don’t release us within the joor with what I’ve requested waiting on our level, you’ll be in receipt of a lawsuit from the Towers of Iacon!”

Orion ended the call before the echo from his raised vocals had subsided and pivoted to find Ratchet rewarding him with the first genuine smile of the night.

“Very impressive, Orion.”

Slightly embarrassed, Orion returned to his side and questioned, “You heard it all?”

That was answered by the first laugh. “I wouldn’t be surprised if the entire ward heard it. You, running hot. It doesn’t happen often enough, if you ask me.”

“I didn’t,” Orion scolded him, but it was said with a warm undertone.

So he probably hadn't heard the first part of Orion’s request, asking for a hover chair. Ratchet wasn’t going to like that, but there was no way he would be able to walk out of here on his own two feet, especially not with the heavy drug he was going to be given. Orion would likely need to drive him home, too. He shelved those thoughts before he forgot the last thing he needed to do.

“Ratchet?”

A tense hum was the only response, meaning the pain would be spiking again sometime soon. It probably wasn’t a good time, but would there ever be a good time tonight?

“Ratchet, I…”

“Oh, for Primus’ sake, Orion. What is it? I’m trying to manage my vents over here.”

“I’m sorry I misunderstood you. I’ll do my best to differentiate when you need advice and when you don’t.”

Ratchet huffed softly, shuttering his optics again and grimacing. “Thank you. I’ll do my best to tell you without throwing an energon cube at your head.”

Orion nodded approvingly, knowing that was his friend’s version of an apology. With that settled, they remained silent, steadying each other when the lift rumbled and resumed its descent.


End file.
